"How did you get in here? I wasn't too drunk to lock the door."
"Through the dressing room. There's a secret passage that leads into many rooms in the palace. I discovered it three years ago," Tess murmured absently, still studying the golden-haired woman nestled close to Galen. "That's Lady Camilla, isn't it? She looks thinner without her clothes. Who is the other one?"
"That's none of your concern." He frowned. "Said is sleeping in the dressing room."
"Your servant? I was very quiet. He didn't wake up." She shrugged dismissively. "But that's not important. I need your help." She glanced at the sheet he'd pulled over his hips. "Are you cold?" She turned and snatched his crimson velvet robe from a chair beside the bed. "Here, put this on."
"Thank you," he said dryly as he slipped his arms into the sleeves of the robe. "You're very considerate, if not overly circumspect."
Camilla turned over and moaned in her sleep.
Tess glanced casually at her. "They're both sleeping very soundly. Are they in their cups too?"
"They've had a few glasses of wine."
Tess critically studied the slumbering women. "More than a few glasses. But I suppose we don't want to chance waking them. I really shouldn't be here."
"I believe I've already made that observation."
"I'll wait for you in the dressing room." She turned and started across the chamber to the door of the antechamber.
"If Said wakes up, he'll cut your throat before I can join you. The men of our tribe do not appreciate midnight visitors."
"I've learned to move very quietly. I won't wake him."
"Then you can move right back to your chamber. I have no intention of going anyw—" The back of the child's white gown was spattered with brown-red stains. Bloodstains.
She glanced over her shoulder. "What?"
"Nothing. Go on. I'll join you in a moment."
She opened the paneled door and disappeared from view.
Galen muttered a curse as he carefully climbed over Camilla and slipped from the bed.
He didn't need this problem after several hours of roistering and sexual indulgence. His head was only a little clearer than Sacha's, and his temper was not of the best. If the child had been beaten by that brutal ox of a father, it was Sacha's concern and not Galen's. She was not his kinswoman, and he had no reason to feel such a flare of rage at the sight of blood on her gown. His emotion for the waif probably stemmed from his rescue of her from the bog. He would listen to her tale of woe and then send her back to her chamber with a promise to talk to Sacha in the morning.
He opened the door to the dressing room to find Tess sitting patiently on a chair against the far wall. Lord, she was tiny. Fine-boned and fragile, she looked closer to nine than twelve in her prim, full-skirted white gown. The candle she had set on the low console beside her chair revealed a dusting of golden freckles over her small nose and burnished her wild aureole of curls. Said slept peacefully on a cot opposite Tess, Galen noticed with exasperation. How the devil had she managed not to wake him?
Galen stepped inside the room. "Said!"
Said Abdul raised his tousled head, instantly awake. "What is—" He broke off as he saw the child sitting a few yards away. "Who—"
"That's not important." Galen could hardly blame him for being stunned. When Said had retired for the night, the females with whom Galen had been occupied had definitely not been children. "Leave us. I'll call when I need you."
Said nodded dazedly, rolled out of bed, wrapping his blanket around his naked body. In another moment he stumbled past Galen into the bedchamber.
Tess sat up straighter in the chair as Galen shut the door and leaned back against it. "I have to hurry. Father told my mother she must take more concern in my upbringing, and she may check on me tonight."
"Your back?"
She frowned uncomprehendingly. "What are— Oh, is it bleeding again? I'm glad you told me. I'll have to soak my gown in cold water when I get back to my chamber." She shook her head. "No, my mother suspects Pauline of not watching me closely enough."
"Your presence here certainly supports that supposition." His lips tightened. "I'm glad someone cares that you're not in your bed at this hour."
"Of course they care," she said, surprised. "I have value for them. They have no son, and I must make a great marriage to compensate for my mother's failing. If anything happened to me, they would have nothing."
"I see." Arranged marriages were also common in his country, but for some reason the idea that this child was treated only as a game piece filled him with anger. "And who are you to marry?"
"It will be decided later. I should really be affianced by now." She wrinkled her nose. "But my father hopes I will become more comely later and attract better offers." Her gaze went to the door of the bedchamber. "Like Lady Camilla. She had many offers before they wed her to Count Evaigne. You must be a great relief to her after fornicating with that old man."
He bowed mockingly. "I tried to make the experience memorable. She did not seem disap—" He broke off as he realized he was talking to her as if she were an experienced lady of the court instead of a girl still in the schoolroom. "We should not be talking about the lady's infidelities."
She turned her crystal-gray gaze on him. "Why not? I meant no insult. I know that this is how things are done. First, the marriage, and then a young, strong man to bed. Pauline says that every wife has a lover, sometimes two or—"
"I'm not interested in what Pauline says," he said irritably. "Why are you here?"
She drew a deep breath. "Apollo."
Whatever he had expected, it was not this. "The dog?"
Tess nodded, her small hands clutching the arms of the chair. "I was stupid. Pauline was angry about the gown, and I told her about Apollo and the bog. She told my mother, and my mother told my father, and—"
"He beat you."
She looked at him, startled. "Why should that bother me? I expected nothing else. No, it was Apollo. My father was angry, and said that this was the last straw. The bitch will not mate, and Apollo had almost cost him dear." Her enormous eyes were filled with tears that shimmered in the candlelight. "He ordered them both killed."
He felt a sudden surge of tenderness as he gazed at her. He, too, had experienced the pain of having beloved animals taken from him by death. "I'm sorry."
"I did not come to you for sympathy. I need help." She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "It's not done yet, and I can't let it happen. As soon as they locked me in my chamber, I came out the secret passage and across the courtyard to the kennels to see Simon, the kennel master. He's a good man. He said he could put off killing the dogs, but they must be gone before my father visits in the morning."
"And you want me to get rid of them?"
"No, I wanted Sacha, but he was in—"
"His cups," Galen finished. "So I'm your second choice."
"Don't you see? I have no place to take them where they'll be safe, and, in truth, you are a much better choice than Sacha, ' she said eagerly. "Because even if Sacha sent the dogs to one of his estates in the country, my father might still hear of it and take action, but he would never go to Sedikhan."